Revoou is a product review and product recommendation content producer and website that provides Spanish-language online shoppers with independent and trustworthy, easy-to-digest information and comparison tables about products and services to make the most informed online purchasing decisions.
It’s a model English-speakers have seen dozens of times, but the team of Revoou, consisting of Andres Lombana, Nicolas Martinez, and Peter Mavilla, is one of the first to tackle it on a broad scale for Spanish-speaking populations from Alaska to Patagonia.
“There’s an opportunity to add value to the ecosystem and the consumer itself,” said Lombana, Revoou’s CEO.
Lack of Content
Martinez, Revoou’s numbers guy, sent his mother out to do some online research for a new tablet. She doesn’t speak English, and not only did she not end up with a tablet recommendation, she had some sobering news for him following her online searches.
“She came back to me saying that she didn’t find any of these sites,” he said. “I realized then that a place like Revoou.com would add a lot of value for the U.S. Hispanic consumer and the Spanish-speaking population in general.”
The team was able to add Mavilla to help them on the tech side.
“They actually touched a problem that I, as a Spanish speaker, have experienced a lot,” said Mavilla. “The lack of Spanish quality commerce content. It’s actually a big problem to tackle.”
According to Mavilla and the data, Googling something in Spanish will get you around 30% of the results as Googling the same question in English. And this isn’t a new problem. It’s something Mavilla and many Spanish speakers have dealt with their whole life. At 30, he’s a digital native and believes that to get good results and find things online, it is almost mandatory to learn English.
Why Online Reviews?
“People want to make smart purchasing decisions,” said Lombana. “And a bad purchasing decision is very easy to make online.”
And because there is so much choice and so much information when shopping on the internet, Martinez says a trusted third party—the role Revoou wants to fill for Spanish-speaking consumers—becomes key.
“Reviews have become really important because we’re flooded with products of all kinds and simply have not enough time to do a thorough analysis when we are going to make the purchase,” he said.
So what people look for is consumer-focused journalism, impartial reviews comparing products based on their qualities. These reviews are designed to help consumers easily digest essential key information to make informed purchasing decisions.
The United States, Europe, and Australia have seen a spike in such models in the past eight years, growing to be 15% of all e-commerce revenue now comes through affiliate links.
Hispanic Online Shoppers Are on the Rise
Usually, Latin America is about one or two years behind the U.S. when it comes to technological trends. So the team at Revoou believes Latin America is on the verge of an e-commerce and affiliate shopping boom.
“It’s not a question of if it is going to happen, it’s when—and it’s now,” said Lombana.
E-commerce content and reviews can be costly to produce, and publishing staffs have already been shrinking in recent years. Revoou has a B-C component but sees the majority of its business as being a B-B solution for publishers looking for new revenue streams as well as quality content around e-commerce. The Latin American e-commerce market between 2020 to 2024 has a projected volume of more than $580 billion. In addition, the total of U.S. e-commerce attributed to U.S. Hispanics is about $860 billion. Lombana says this was no doubt accelerated by the pandemic.
Positioned to Solve the Problem
Martinez, Mavilla, and Lombana share an entrepreneurial spirit with proven success. On top of that spirit, Lombana has a background in publishing and Spanish-language content with Tribune Content Agency and a deep knowledge of successful business models and technology behind consumer reviews and affiliate content marketing.
“Revoou is the intersection of leveraging a lot of my experience and network,” said Lombana.
The team at Revoou also has some experts in the biz ready to lend a hand. Revoou collaborates with Ever-growing, which offers product recommendations and charts to publishers and also allows them to monetize it through affiliate linking.
This partnership has allowed Revoou to accelerate their own learning curve.
